24-70 2.8 alternative

macgregor said:
Alright, the 35-70 nikon ais finally arrived today. I´ve been testing it and I´m surprised about how good it feels considering its price.
Focus and zooming is very smooth, perfect for manual video.
Vignetting is high wide open at 35mm and surprisingly good at 50 and 70mm.
Blooming, which was my biggest fear with this lens, is great at 35mm, bad at 50mm and good again at 70mm (wide open of course). At f4, it´s clearly much better and totally gone at 5.6. ALways talking about photos, in video, it's hard to see the difference so I think I´m safe shooting wide open.
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Anymore info or samples? and comparisons
ThankYou Kindly
 
Working on that.
The lens is not parfocal at the infinite mark, but I see no change in focus on other distances, although there should be (it is marked in the barrel).

I also got the 24-70 2.8, so I´ll compare.
 
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macgregor said:
Hi all, I´m looking for an alternative to the nikon 24-70 f2.8 zoom lens, not that I want to save money but I want a lens with better manual focus capabilities for shooting video. On this lens, you go from 2m to infinity in like 1 degree. Any recommendations?
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Imo, it'll be hard to beat the quality of the Nikkor 24-70/2.8, so if it's the focusing that bugs you, maybe look for a solution on that end? Meaning, use a rail/follow focus sytem, such as this:
http://www.arri.de/camera/pro_camera_accessories/follow_focus/mini_follow_focus_mff_2.html

This system allows for more exact and subtle focusing adjustments, and you get to keep your Nikkor quality.
 
Of course a follow focus helps a lot with MF on AF lenses, but - inspired by this thread - I was interested to see if a manual focus lens would allow for smoother rack focusing with a follow focus. The focal length looked useful to me for FX video and the cheap price of this lens meant the experiment was fairly painless: I picked up a near mint condition 35-70 ais constant f3.5 lens this week for £85. Anyway, I was impressed to find that the lens allows much smoother focusing on a follow focus than any of my modern AF Nikkors: obviously the smoother/damped focusing and the greater turning required help a follow focus work - not entirely surprising. What was surprising to me (despite reviews and comments above confirming this!) was just how sharp this lens is, especially when stopped down just a little (and this was pixel peeping at stills on a D800). I can see exactly why Sam is so keen on the lens!
Cheers,
Roland
 
I've shot Nikon for fashion stills since the early 90's with plenty of AF glass... but for video, you just can't beat the feel of a manual lens. I assume the AF glass is engineered to make it as easy as possible for the AF motor for speed & battery life - which translates to a really loose feeling lens.

That said, I've got a real crush on an old 35-70 2.8 AF lens, the more I use it the more I like it. Not as wide as a 24 for sure, especially with an APS sensor. Mine has a more damped focus feel than my AF primes. Many of the 35-70 AFs have "veiling flare" issues, which can give the image a milky, washed-out look when light hits the front element. Thing is, it's a really pretty sort of flare if you control it (it's not like pings & rings & starbursts, just a lifting of the blacks that looks very "cinematic" to me). You can dial it in with a matte box, almost like it has a volume knob. A really old-school metal lens, nice & heavy. And - it's got killer macro capability - goes 1:1 on a full frame. Sweet!

Video frame:

MVI_3026.jpg
 
Michael Carter said:
I've shot Nikon for fashion stills since the early 90's with plenty of AF glass... but for video, you just can't beat the feel of a manual lens. I assume the AF glass is engineered to make it as easy as possible for the AF motor for speed & battery life - which translates to a really loose feeling lens. That said, I've got a real crush on an old 35-70 2.8 AF lens, the more I use it the more I like it. Not as wide as a 24 for sure, especially with an APS sensor. Mine has a more damped focus feel than my AF primes. Many of the 35-70 AFs have "veiling flare" issues, which can give the image a milky, washed-out look when light hits the front element. Thing is, it's a really pretty sort of flare if you control it (it's not like pings & rings & starbursts, just a lifting of the blacks that looks very "cinematic" to me). You can dial it in with a matte box, almost like it has a volume knob. A really old-school metal lens, nice & heavy. And - it's got killer macro capability - goes 1:1 on a full frame. Sweet! Video frame: View attachment 61004
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@Michael Carter, Sweet Frame. I used to own the 35-70D with my D700. Thinking of picking it up again, along with a 105/2 DC.
 
Thanks last - I got mine from KEH or eBay for about $275 with a dinged filter ring. It's a real classic for sure. Frame grab is from a BTS project i do every year for a fashion advertising shoot, total run & gun with no control over lighting. The DSLR on a shoulder mount has really wowed the client. I use the 35-70 for 90% of the DSLR stuff, an old 100 2.8 Series E for some - if you can grab one of those, do it - amazing lens and probably the best of the series E for sharpness and just flat-out mojo. On a small-sensor cam it's really dynamite.
 
I'm digging mine so far (35-70/3.5 AI-S). It was cheap, so even if it sucked it wouldn't have been an issue, but it's pretty decent so far. Only downside at the moment is that the filter threads rotate with focus - I tend to use Cokin ND filters, so it's a bit of a pain having the Cokin holder spinning around as I pull focus. It is nice and sharp, especially at 5.6, but the best part is how well it controls distortion. I know some lenses are completely unusable for video because of how they go from Barrel to Pincushion as they're zoomed, but this one holds it down pretty nicely. I think I'm still going to stick with primes for shooting short film type stuff, but it's handy to have a zoom on for jobs where I don't have total control of who or what I'm shooting. It's also become one of my new favourite lenses for walkabout stills photography, since in daylight I'll mostly have stopped my 35 and 50mm primes down to around 5.6 anyway and the sharpness is pretty even, and it distorts a LOT less than the 50/1.4 AF-S.
 
macgregor said:
It's actually for a DX sensor, and again, it needs to be constant aperture. Budget is not an issue.

Does the Tamron 24-70 have a better manual focus traveling distance?
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Hey Macgregor, sorry I'm late to he party on replies here.

I did have the Nikon 24-70 and ended up selling it because I had the same problem on focus travel.

I bought the tamron and usually I'm not a fan of their lenses but I do love it. The focusing is great & I do like its optical performance. It's does breathe a little when focusing though.

Hope that helps.
 
seanwin said:
Hey Macgregor, sorry I'm late to he party on replies here.

I did have the Nikon 24-70 and ended up selling it because I had the same problem on focus travel.

I bought the tamron and usually I'm not a fan of their lenses but I do love it. The focusing is great & I do like its optical performance. It's does breathe a little when focusing though.

Hope that helps.
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Arggg, too late.

So I ended up buying the nikon 24-70 2.8 and the nikon ais 35-70 f3.5.
The 24-70 is useless for video, period. There's no way to focus that lens.
The 35-70 on the contrary is wondeful for manual focus. The downside is the aperture.
I'll have to try the tamron I guess...
 
macgregor said:
Arggg, too late.

So I ended up buying the nikon 24-70 2.8 and the nikon ais 35-70 f3.5.
The 24-70 is useless for video, period. There's no way to focus that lens.
The 35-70 on the contrary is wondeful for manual focus. The downside is the aperture.
I'll have to try the tamron I guess...
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Useless in that the focus throw is short, or anything else? I don't think the tamron is much more than 90 degrees, but it is smooth. It also has VR (or VC), which is really nice for video. Peronally I went with the nikon 24-120 f/4 because of the longer zoom range. And allthough the focus throw is short, I wouldn't call it useless. I would think the tamron is quite nice, but you just won't get long travel manual focus on any of these modern lenses.
 
Yep, focus throw in the 24-70 is sooo minimal , half a degree might mean 2 meters. Not good for video. I had the 24-120 and it was only slightly better. I sold it because of that.
 
chagchag said:
[The Tamron 17-50mm f2.8] also has VR (or VC), which is really nice for video. Peronally I went with the nikon 24-120 f/4 because of the longer zoom range.
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I found the Tamron's VR to be extremely finicky and unusable for video. It takes the better part of a second to settle down and felt over-reactive after that. I suspect it was designed solely for still photography and not tested for video shooting.

The Nikon 24-120mm f4, OTOH, is everything the Tamron is not. Its adjustable VR performs seamlessly in video mode and for still shots, it enables you to shoot with a 1/8th-sec shutter at 120mm. That, plus its sharp, constant f4 aperture makes the Nikon a far better low-light lens than the soft f2.8 of the Tamron. The wide DOF you get at f4 is such a luxury compared to the trials of manually focusing a flare-prone prime at f1.4. On that note, however, I'd have to admit the narrow focus ring on the 24-120mm is practically vestigial, though I've had no problems using it as an exclusively auto-focus lens.
 
macgregor said:
Yep, focus throw in the 24-70 is sooo minimal , half a degree might mean 2 meters. Not good for video. I had the 24-120 and it was only slightly better. I sold it because of that.
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I agree it is not optimal for focusing, but I find it quite usable (of course it depends on focal length and what you shoot). Do you use a follow focus? One thing that helps is using a follow focus system that supports different size gear-wheels. A smaller one will decrease the the movement on the lens barrel compared to the actual turn of the follow focus. (I'm talking about the gears on the actual followfocus, not the ones you put on the lens.)
 
I like my "old" AF-S Nikkor 28-70
It has a gazillion stills on it and now I mostly use it for my "Home Movies".
 
Anyone used the new 24-85 3.5-4.5. Curious to hear about the focus and breathing.

I have the 24-70 but its very heavy and lacks VC and i'm interested in the 24-85 as lens as an out and about handheld daytime video lens. I rarely shoot at stops smaller than F4 when shooting handheld video so the speed wont be problematic.
 
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I would take a look at the Tamron 28-75mm f2.8 lens that sells for around $500. Very good image quality and may be easier for you to manually focus. A good part of your problem is the short focal length of the lens. The depth of field is too great for what you want to do and a longer focal length lens like the 24-120 or 70-200 may be a better choice.
 
AlexanderC said:
Anyone used the new 24-85 3.5-4.5. Curious to hear about the focus and breathing.
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Ive just got the old manual 28-85 - $150 - so worth a try!

It is a very fine lens, focus smoothness is amazing (my main criteria for enjoying a lens)

Its a bit weird though the macro facility is at the 28 end, its certainly not parfocal

But it is still IMO a totally different (better) class to any AF lens like my 35-70 which I am very fond of

A must buy and try.

S
 
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